Questions about submitting an article -- 19th Century British Literature

[Mattie Roh]

I've been working on an article that came out of my MA work and my adviser and I feel confident that it's ready for submission. Since I'm not a current student, though, I'm obviously not a priority and email communcations between us have been slow. I thought it'd be helpful for me to reach out on GC to answer some basic questions I have.

 

Briefly, my paper examines how the rise of the professional influences the protagonist's career choices in Amy Levy's 1888 novel, The Romance of a Shop.

 

How does one decide which journal to submit to first? I have several in mind (Journal of Victorian Culture, ELH, Nineteenth-Century Contexts, Nineteenth-Century Literature, Victorian Literature and Culture, Victorian Studies), but they all seem to have similar descriptions about the type of work they're looking for.

 

Also, what is the proper format for a cover note? Is it simply my abstract? The examples I've found online don't appear to apply to literary studies and it'd be great if someone had a website to suggest as a resource.

 

This is my first (but hopefully not last) go-around so any advice would be greatly appreciated!

[Roquentin]

One approach is to start with the top ranked journal and then work your way down the list (note: can be very time consuming). Different journals will have different specifications about what they require beyond your paper itself. If by cover note you mean your initial correspondence with the journal's editor, then I'd recommend keeping things short and simple. It's usually enough to say "Please find attached an article submission, (title), for (journal title). Thank you for your consideration." If the journal asks for other stuff (abstract, keywords, bio, etc.), I'll send that in another attachment.

[Mattie Roh]

Thanks. I think I may just be over-thinking this a bit.

[Cactus Ed]

About a year and a half ago I was in the same boat: looking to publish a (heavily revised) chapter from my M.A. thesis. I was in my first year of my PhD program and took a course on scholarly publishing, and what I learned ended up getting me a publication in the leading journal in my field. So here's my advice on selecting a journal (besides taking time to look through the last 5 years or so of each journal to vet the types of subject matter they tend to publish):

 

1. Consult your bibliography. If you're trying to figure out which journal might be interested in your article, you can save yourself some time by looking at articles you cite in your paper to figure out which journals might be open to accepting work in the same vein. While this doesn't serve as a stand-in for doing further research on journals, it can help narrow the field down a bit. 

 

2. Search the Penn CFP page to see if there are any special issues that might be good for your article (http://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/) 

 

3. If you still have access to the library database from your M.A. institution, search the MLA Directory of Periodicals. This will give you crucial information on submission information, including number of articles submitted vs. accepted per year at any journal, peer review details, time to decision, and more. You can use this information to weight the options. 

 

4. Aim high. Assuming that this is your first submission, you've got relatively little to lose if your article is rejected. And you've really got lots to gain. If you get a revise and resubmit or an acceptance, that's awesome. If you get a rejection (which is the norm even for established scholars), you will often get very valuable reader's reports that can help you strengthen your article before resubmission. 

Sorry for the long response. This was the information given to me and my article was accepted outright the first time I accepted. While that's not the norm, I do think this advice helped a lot. 

[Mattie Roh]

Thank you! All of this is incredibly helpful. The school at which I did my graduate work was small (and also an hour away) so I have a hard time taking advantages of the few resources it has.

[med latte]

About a year and a half ago I was in the same boat: looking to publish a (heavily revised) chapter from my M.A. thesis. I was in my first year of my PhD program and took a course on scholarly publishing, and what I learned ended up getting me a publication in the leading journal in my field. 

 

 

 

Hi Cactus Ed,

You mentioned that you took a course in academic publishing. Can you tell us a bit more? Was this part of your Ph.D. program coursework, or a public workshop? It sounds like a great resource.

Thanks!

[Cactus Ed]

Sorry for the delayed reply. 

 

This course was part of my PhD coursework and part of a recent initiative on the part of the department to take responsibility for helping professionalize students in a more formal setting. In the past we've had lots of extra-curricular workshops and talks that were woefully under-attended, so my program now offers this course, one on the pedagogy of teaching literature, and others. 

 

It was a great course to take in that it essentially functioned as a 12-person workshop in which we all arrived with a draft (seminar paper length/20+ pp.), distributed that draft, and each student got to sit (silently) and listen to the class discuss the piece amongst themselves and give feedback. Each student got two "sessions" like this - once before and once after revision. It was nerve-wracking to hear a room full of people discuss my written work, but incredibly useful, too. 

 

We also did a lot of reading on scholarly publishing and learned how to familiarize ourselves with the journals in our fields, how to do things as simply as write abstracts and cover letters effectively, as well as what book proposals look like. 

Edited March 25, 2015 by Cactus Ed

[chateaulafitte]

 

Also, what is the proper format for a cover note? Is it simply my abstract? The examples I've found online don't appear to apply to literary studies and it'd be great if someone had a website to suggest as a resource.

 

Yes, your title and abstract, that's pretty much it. Some people argue you should write a short bio/intro, but it's not necessary.

 

I agree that you should also consult the  MLA directory of periodicals: http://www.mla.org/dop

(note that the data is sometimes a bit outdated, but it still gives an idea of what's going on with a given journal )

 

A link that could be of use, the Humanities Journals wiki, where people share their experiences with different journals: http://humanitiesjournals.wikia.com/wiki/Humanities_Journals_Wiki

 

And it's true that you should aim high.

 

Good luck!